As a volunteer medical orderly in East Prussia and Belgium in 1914–15, Beckmann was in direct contact with the war’s destruction and victims, both in the operating rooms of military hospitals and on the battlefield. Before being discharged after suffering a nervous breakdown, the artist made numerous drawings and several drypoints of his wartime experiences, including this one featuring doctors, nurses, orderlies, and the wounded as angular, distorted forms in a tightly compressed space—rendered with agitated, scratchy strokes that heighten the sense of controlled chaos and repressed trauma.

Bibliography

"Acquisitions of the Princeton University Art Museum 2005," Record of the Princeton University Art Museum 65 (2006): p. 49-81.